This article is about the unit in Age of Empires II. For the unit in Age of Empires IV, see Bombard. For the technology, see Bombard Cannon (technology). |
“ | Siege weapon with long range. | ” |
—Age of Empires II description |
The Bombard Cannon is a long-ranged gunpowder siege unit in Age of Empires II that can be trained at the Siege Workshop in the Imperial Age once Chemistry is researched.
The unit has an upgrade, Houfnice, only available to the Bohemians.
Availability chart[]
Available | Unavailable |
---|---|
- x means that the civilization gets Siege Engineers. Consequently, it can fully upgrade its Bombard Cannons.
- + means that the civilization gets at least one civilization or team bonus or a unique technology that benefits the combat strength of the Bombard Cannon.
- ✝ means that the civilization had access to Bombard Cannons in the past, but does not currently.
Tactics[]
The Bombard Cannon is very powerful and very versatile. It outranges all generic ranged buildings, and while it is not the best anti-building siege in terms of raw damage, it still has the firepower to be effective in said role. Bombard Cannons are a powerful counter to siege units like Scorpions and Onagers, and can be effectively used against most units, provided they are far enough away to avoid any damage. They are also a great counter to Trebuchets, but should be moving while dealing with them in order not to be hit. Like Mangonels, Bombard Cannons have friendly splash damage and must be used with caution.
Their biggest downside is that they are incredibly expensive: 225 wood, 225 gold. Additionally, they are very slow and have lackluster durability, so they will quickly falter if attacked. They are also hard to mass, due to not only a high cost, but also a training time of 56 seconds. Fortunately, even in low numbers, they can be effective support for an army against buildings and siege.
Comparison to the Trebuchet[]
The Bombard Cannon and Trebuchet are the longest ranged and most expensive siege weapons in the game. The Bombard Cannon is more maneuverable than the Trebuchet, as it does not require the packing and unpacking that the Trebuchet does. However, Trebuchets are slightly cheaper, costing -25 wood, -25 gold than Bombard Cannons and are available to every civilization, unlike Bombard Cannons, which are only available to some civilizations and require Chemistry. Trebuchets are also more resilient, especially to ranged attackers, and can be used to destroy trees.
Comparing their attacks, Bombard Cannons are more accurate and deal splash damage against units, but have shorter range and can damage friendly units. They deal significantly less damage to their targets than Trebuchets, but fire faster and with much faster projectiles.
Overall, Bombard Cannons are superior to Trebuchets in terms of versatility as they are effective against both buildings and units, but the Trebuchet's greater range and attack are unrivaled when it comes to taking down enemy buildings, especially during early Imperial Age, as Chemistry takes 100 seconds to research.
Note that several civilizations have bonuses for Bombard Cannons, which makes them better for this comparison. The Italians and Portuguese get a discount for them, the Turks get better durability, range, and free Chemistry, the Burgundians get extra attack, and the Bohemians get the Houfnice upgrade.
Comparison table[]
Bombard Cannon | Onager | Trebuchet | |
---|---|---|---|
Research cost | 300 food, 200 gold 100 seconds |
800 food, 500 gold 75 seconds |
none |
Hit points | 80 | 60 | 150 |
Armor | 2/5 | 0/7 | 2/8 or 1/150 |
Blast Radius | 0.5 | 1.25 | 0 |
Range | 12 | 8 | 16 |
Main Role | Anti-siege Anti-building |
Anti-foot unit Clearing forests |
Anti-building |
Availability | 24/43 civilizations (~56%) | All except Huns and Turks | All |
Further statistics[]
Strengths and weaknesses | |
---|---|
Strong vs. | Buildings, units in dense formations, siege weapons |
Weak vs. | Mangudai, melee units at close range, and fast melee units like most cavalry, Woad Raiders and Elite Eagle Warriors |
Technologies | |
---|---|
Attack | Siege Engineers (+20% against buildings) |
Range | Siege Engineers (+1) Artillery (+2, Turks only) |
Accuracy | Arquebus (track moving targets, faster projectile, Portuguese only) |
Armor | Ironclad (+4/+0, Teutons only) |
Conversion resistance | Devotion (+1 min, +1 max) Faith (+4 min, +4 max) Heresy (die upon getting converted) |
Movement speed | Wagenburg Tactics (+15%, Bohemians only) |
Other | Torsion Engines (+0.45 tile blast damage radius, Ethiopians only) |
Civilization bonuses | |
---|---|
Hit points | Turks (+25%) |
Attack | Burgundians (+25%) |
Armor | Hindustanis (+1/+1) |
Attack speed | Spanish (+18%) |
Resource cost | Dravidians (-33% wood) Italians (-20%) Portuguese (-20% gold) |
Other | Italians (Chemistry costs -33%) Turks (Chemistry is free) |
Team bonuses | |
---|---|
Conversion resistance | Teutons (+3 min, +1 max) |
Creation speed | Celts (+20%) Turks (+25%) |
Other | Celts (upgrading to the Houfnice is 20% faster) Malians (researching Chemistry is 80% faster) Portuguese (researching Chemistry and upgrading to the Houfnice is 25% faster) |
Civilization bonuses[]
- Bohemians: Chemistry is available in the Castle Age.
- Burmese: Researching Devotion and Faith is 50% cheaper.
- Spanish: Researching technologies that benefit Bombard Cannons provides 20 gold each.
Team bonuses[]
- Lithuanians: Researching Heresy, Devotion, and Faith is 20% faster.
- Malians: Researching Siege Engineers is 80% faster.
- Portuguese: Technologies that benefit Bombard Cannons are researched 25% faster.
Changelog[]
The Age of Kings[]
- The Bombard Cannon technology must be researched before Bombard Cannons can be trained.
- Bombard Cannons have 50 hit points.
- Bombard Cannons deal +120 and 0 attack bonus against buildings and siege weapons respectively.
- Turks: Bombard Cannons have +50% hit points.
The Conquerors[]
- The Bombard Cannon technology is removed from the game, and Bombard Cannons become available as soon as Chemistry is researched.
- Bombard Cannons have 80 hit points.
- Bombard Cannons deal +20 attack bonus against siege weapons.
- With patch 1.0b, Bombard Cannons deal +200 attack bonus against buildings.
- Bombard Cannons' projectiles are faster.
- Heresy introduced.
- Turks: Bombard Cannons have +25% hit points. Artillery introduced.
- Bombard Cannons have 92% accuracy.
The Forgotten[]
The African Kingdoms[]
- Italians: With patch 4.8, Bombard Cannons are 20% cheaper.
- Portuguese: Bombard Cannons cost -15% gold. Arquebus increases the projectile speed of Bombard Cannons by +0.5.
Rise of the Rajas[]
- Portuguese: Arquebus has a smaller effect on gunpowder units, the speed modifier is reduced by 75%. With patch 5.3, the speed modifier for Bombard Cannons is removed. With patch 5.7, the speed modifier for Bombard Cannons is +0.2 tiles per second.
Definitive Edition[]
- Bombard Cannons have 100% accuracy (meaning blast damage is always inflicted).
- Khmer: With update 36906, the Bombard Cannon is no longer available.
- Portuguese: With update 39284, Bombard Cannons cost -20% gold.
- Portuguese: With update 42848, as a civilization bonus, technologies that benefit Bombard Cannons are researched 30% faster.
Dawn of the Dukes[]
- Bohemians: The Houfnice is introduced as the unique upgrade for the Bombard Cannon. The upgrade costs 950 food, 750 gold.
Dynasties of India[]
- Dravidians: Upon release, they did not have access to the Bombard Cannon. With update 66692, they get access to the unit.
- Portuguese: With update 73855, as a team bonus, technologies that benefit Bombard Cannons are researched 25% faster.
- Bohemians: With update 78174, the Houfnice upgrade costs 1,100 food, 800 gold.
- Dravidians: With update 81058, Bombard Cannons cost -33% wood.
Heroes[]
There are two heroes in the game with the appearance of a Bombard Cannon:
Trivia[]
- Although the Chinese invented the cannon in real life, their in-game civilization does not have access to it for balance purposes.
- In the scenario Into China, the Mongols can capture Bombard Cannons from the Chinese Engineers, and the AI script for the Jin instructs them to build cannons despite being Chinese, implying that the civilization had access to them during development.
- In terms of gold and wood, the Bombard Cannon is the most expensive unit in the game; the latter only since Rise of the Rajas when the Siege Tower was made cheaper.
- Before The African Kingdoms was released, the Bombard Cannon was the only siege weapon that was created at the Siege Workshop that had no upgrade. In The African Kingdoms, the Siege Tower was added.
- At release, all new civilizations introduced in The African Kingdoms and Rise of the Rajas had access to the Bombard Cannon. However, the Khmer lost access to the Bombard Cannon in update 36906, making them the only civilization that lost access to the Bombard Cannon.
- Both civilizations introduced in Dawn of the Dukes have access to the Bombard Cannon.
- Neither of the Central Asian civilizations have access to Bombard Cannon.
- The Bombard Cannon is the only unit which is mobile, ranged anti-building unit. The mobile and ranged aspect also makes it anti-siege, a role they perform better than Onagers due to having more range. Massed Siege Onagers can also accomplish the three traits with civilizations like Celts, Mongols, Koreans, and Saracens.
- Except Ironclad, unique technologies and most civilization bonuses either affect Battering Rams-Mangonels-Scorpions, Trebuchets, or Bombard Cannons (and other gunpowder siege weapons). Ironclad is the only unique technology which affects all siege weapons.
- Theoretically, Bombard Cannons are affected by Drill, Furor Celtica, Slavic siege discount etc (none of which affect Trebuchets).
- Torsion Engines affects Rams-Mangonels-Scorpions as well as Bombard Cannons, but not Trebuchets.
- The Celt faster-firing bonus affects all types of siege weapons too, but Celts do not have Bombard Cannons. This makes it the only siege-specific civilization bonus to affect Battering Rams-Mangonels-Scorpions and Trebuchets both.
History[]
“ | Gunpowder reached Europe from China by the thirteenth century and primitive cannons appeared first in the fourteenth century. Bombard cannons were large, ponderous, and dangerous to fire because the guns tended to break and because gunpowder was of uneven quality. They were used mainly in sieges where the time was available to set them up and fire them at a fixed target. By the fifteenth century, bombard cannons firing stone or iron shot were making castles obsolete. Cannons could bring down vertical stone walls quickly by firing shot at high velocity directly into the lower wall sections. Giant bombard cannons manned by European mercenaries were instrumental in the Turkish attack that finally captured Constantinople in 1453. | ” |
—Age of Empires II manual |